Thunderstorms roll through Maritimes
Posted Jul 3, 2012 04:25:51 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Halifax residents may experience a repeat of yesterday’s intense weather with more thunder and lightening and soaring temperatures in the forecast.
The region was pelted with loonie-sized hail, causing damage to cars and property. The storms also brought heavy rains and thunder and lightening as isolated, but intense, storm cells moved through Nova Scotia.
Environment Canada issued severe thunderstorm watches and warnings to some areas of the province with the extra caution that the storms could spawn a tornado. They’re calling for the unsettled weather to continue with an electrical storm in the forecast this afternoon. It’s the second in as many days as an unsettled system rolls over the Maritimes.
Fifteen-hundred customers lost power in Halifax, Bedford and Sackville while 1,400 were without power in Bridgewater. Unsettled weather has been circling the Atlantic, on both sides of the border, for the last week.
Many in the United States are coping a crushing heatwave without power. The death toll from the unexpected weekend storms has risen to 22.
In Virginia, Dominion Power’s David Botkins says the workers who are restoring power are coming up against very difficult conditions.
“The conditions out there are so challenging there’s trees on lines, there’s lines down, all kinds of debri and damage out there,” says Botkins.
Nearly 1.8 million people are without power int he Mid-Atlantic with temperatures approaching 40 degrees. Power crews from Hydro Quebec and Ontario are travelling to the area to help in restoration.
Laurel Goldberg was just one of several people who had a tree fell on their houses during Friday’s storm.
“I didn’t even know the tree had fallen. It actually wasn’t as loud as you’d expect,” Goldberg todl the Canadian Press. “I was waiting for the rest of it to fall and the house to come crashing down, which thankfully didn’t happen.”
Some utility companies are warning that many neighbourhoods could remain in the dark for much of the week, if not longer.
The U-S National Weather Service’S Bob Oravec says there’s no break from the heat in sight for much of the U-S.
“We’re going to continue to have hot weather across a good part of the country. Although the core of the heat has somewhat shifted toward the west, across the middle part of the country from what it has been over the past few days,” said Oravec.
